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In this study of Dual Language Bilingual Education (DLBE), we conducted a quantitative study with K−3 teachers in five schools with DLBE-treatment teachers teaching in English and Spanish and non-DLBE-comparison teachers teaching only in English. The DLBE treatment teachers participated in an 18-month graduate certification with five coaching sessions focused on oral language, vocabulary, and small-group instruction (academic constructs) and classroom interactions (sociocultural). We observed beginning and end-of-year language arts instruction in English and Spanish. For analysis, we used two instruments to measure teachers’ instructional implementation of (1) academic constructs; and (2) classroom interactions. Using descriptive statistics and regression analysis, we examined changes to teachers’ academic content instruction and their classroom interactions over time analyzing effects by treatment condition, experience, age, grade-level, and language of instruction. Findings demonstrate that all DLBE-treatment teachers improved on academic constructs over time. Older DLBE-teachers with fewer years of experience developed more than younger teachers with more consecutive and cumulative experience. DLBE-treatment teachers instructing Spanish demonstrated the highest effect size in creating a classroom ecology of respect. Implications elucidate how explicit professional development alongside of instructional coaching can foster instructional expertise in academic constructs and creating a classroom ecology of interaction and respect. A matrix for language policy and planning is furnished as districts scale and develop their DLBE teaching community.
Morita-Mullaney et al. (Fri,) studied this question.